04/13/2012

Organ Donors

Are you an organ donor? Why or why not have you made this decision? On Saturday on Channel 7, at 7 p.m., you can watch a special, “Connected For Life”, a special that looks at the need for organ donors. Eyewitness News wants to know what you think. Post your comments (below) and they could end up on Eyewitness News First at 4 p.m.

Comments

On 11/11/10 I became an organ donor. It was that day that I donated my left kidney to my husband. We had the wonderful experience of having it done at NY Presbyterian Cornell under the leadership of Dr. S. Kapur, an incredible man.

When it was determined that I was a match, I was amazed and looked at it as a sign that it was "meant to be". The testing was not without challenges as I am retired and at the end of the donation years. Thankfully, my husband is a successful transplant reciepient and I feel it is becaus of NYP. People sometimes tell me I am a hero, I don't feel like one. I just simply "did the right thing".

Thank you for raising awareness about Organ Donor Month, an issue dear to my heart. In recent years, I've led efforts to help desperate patients in my native Guyana to receive life-saving kidney and heart transplants that were performed by American doctors. Along the same lines, my company is collaborating with the New York Blood Center today for a Blood Drive in Jamaica, Queens because it's also an important issue that needs more public awareness.

18 years ago my family went to Columbia presbyterian to say goodbye to my little cousin who needed a heart, connected to an ECMO machine. A new heart was his only chance. Thanks to an unknown family, who decided to, in their grief, donate life, my cousin is an incredible young man! It us hard to look at him without thinking of the little girl who's heart beats within him! After going through this experience, not only are we donors, but I became a nurse after being intrigued by the process. It is amazing that most people would never even think of it, until you are in a desperate of needing an organ!

I have indicated on my driver's license that I am an organ donor since I know that time is of essence when it come for the organs to be transplanted to people in need. Though, I disagree the way in which doctors and hospitals profit from the transplants and no recognition is given to family members of donors. It is a shame that people donate and other greedy people benefit from it. It is also a shame the best quality of organs go first to high class doctors that only have patients with money that can afford their professional services and as time passes and the organs quality decreases then it goes to poor communities. It is a shame indeed.